I had the experience today of getting dragged into a group argument in our local Cafe Nero on Brexit with a very loud ‘bloke’ holding forth to his long suffering other half about how concerns about the supply chain for medicines & medical isotopes were “bullshit”. My friend is a leading consultant in nuclear medicine so intervened and I supported her. We patiently explained the way things work today, IAEA rules, controlled drug transportation regulations and the issues no deal creates minutes one.

Anne-Marie’s relevant expertise was explained to him and I’ve spent much of my career working in or with MedTech, Pharma. I am certainly not the greatest living expert on this but I am realistically an ‘expert’ vs. 99.9% of population from cumulative direct working experience. No matter what we said (and we even showed him relevant documentation and analysis on our phones) the bloke just kept saying the EU would “surrender” (direct wording) and treat us like we have not left despite the legal impossibility of this for e.g. Radioactive material, controlled drugs where EU, like UK, is subject to supranational controls.

Eventually we asked him why he believed he was qualified to speak with such confidence on this, It turned out he is a car mechanic. No personal expertise or relevant experience. Not done any research. Not interested in rules or evidence. When we pressed on why he thought his confidence could be justified in the face of our (and many other people’s) genuine expertise telling him otherwise he said, again a direct quote,. “I’m a proper patriot unlike you”.

We truly are somewhere well beyond ####ed. Even if somewhere in Whitehall some sane and diligent civil servants are beavering away to solve these issues our national psyche is just going to keep creating new problems and more chaos because far too many people in this country now think it is ok for our government to act like spoilt kids throwing tantrums to ‘get our own way. Too many people think wanting = getting and that UK is special and will get special treatment from everyone, rules will be waved and we will get our own way simply because we are British. It is Group psychosis.

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going around that 'everybody knows' and/or 'anyone can see' which are actually complete horseshite is absolutely staggering. I genuinely struggle to understand how people can be so wilfully uninformed..

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talk to who are completely ignorant of any facts and spout off about hthings like how we can grow our own food ( like in WW2) or we can just import it fron elsewhere besides Europe and its all project fear. As for Farage Gove Johnson and the like Im still amazed how working class people support these twats and believe that they have their best interests at heart when in reality they dont give a duck about them. Just prior to the referendum I was working in the North East around Sunderland/ Hartlepool way and witnessed the wholehearted admiration of all things Farage ( mostly about immigration). Mind you some things remain the same, as Im sure the Blackshirts had a significant amount of working class amongst there ranks led by an Aristocrat.

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It has become how I talk to any Brexit supporter who I happen to cross paths with. You are on the same side as Farage, Gove, Johnson et al. I would always be on the other. (Unstated afterthought is 'If you are happy with that good luck I have nothing else to add you forelock tugging imbicile ')